Acute Testosterone Responses to Different Resistance Exercise Intensities

We investigated the acute testosterone response to four different resistance-training protocols. We observed testosterone levels pre-workout, immediately post-workout, and 60-minutes post-workout following a bout of upper body exercise at 70%,1 RM, 90% 1 RM, and lower body exercise at 70% 1 RM and 90% 1 RM. Total training volume was held constant but all amount of weight, sets, and reps were different. 10 healthy, male, resistance trained individuals volunteered for the study. The performed each exercise condition on separate days. Capillary blood was taken via finger prick at the time points specified above. Blood samples were analyzed via Accubind Testosterone ELISA and we found that immediately post-workout following the upper body and lower body moderate intensity (70% 1 RM) workouts testosterone was significantly higher compared to pre-workout (p \u3c 0.05). Following the high intensity (90% 1 RM) exercise protocol testosterone levels were elevated but not statistically significant (p \u3e 0.05). We concluded that 70% 1 RM is a large enough stimulus to observe a significantly higher testosterone response post-workout. 90% 1 RM has been shown previously to be enough of a stimulus, however, this current study did not support those findings